Valiant
by Vol
Summary: What if Tumnus' statue was never found in the Golden Age? What if Lucy returned alone to Narnia when the Horn sounded? What different tale might be then be told? ... AU, Movieverse.
1. If Stone Could but Speak

**Chapter 1: If Stone Could but Speak**_  
In which our hero, not unlike ourselves, has absolutely no idea what is going on._

Twigs snapped underfoot as the young girl struggled through the wet thickets, her bare legs covered with thorny scratches and her once-shiny new shoes now caked in mud. Leaves caught in her tangled dark hair and she slipped once, twice, on the blanket of slick leaves and grass on the slope. The sharp angry voices of her pursuers pushed her on.

The girl's name was Lucy, and she had at one time been a queen.

Grabbing handfuls of wet grass and brush, she stubbornly pushed on up the slope away from the river. The rain was hard, the slope steep, and those after her wore heavy armour while she was a but a slip of a girl, fourteen and quite small for her age. By their shouts, they had mistaken her in the darkness for a forest spirit or some strange dwarf.

_You must be some kind of ... beardless dwarf?_ Lucy smiled, even through the tears and rain. Her strange homecoming was met with similar misunderstandings, it seemed, and a similar welcome of danger and pursuit.

A branch caught on her tartan skirt, tearing an even larger hole where an arrow had missed her by hairs. She yanked it free, losing a few precious inches as her wet shoes fought for purchase. She wrapped her small, chilled hands around the trunk of a wiry pine and thought, for just a moment, that it bent ever so slightly to pull her up. She propelled herself up and over the edge of the ravine, stumbling so suddenly on the even ground that she landed in a wet bedraggled heap.

The voices below her grew stronger.

Slithering like a lizard on the muddy leaves, she scrambled around the trunks of birch and pine, groping in the near-darkness to get her feet beneath her. Mud was in her eyes, stinging in her nose and mouth. What a sight she was! Lucy the Valiant, Lucy the Fair, Bold Lucy, the Warrior Queen of Narnia! Covered in mud, soaking wet, stumbling about in the dark like a half-drowned stoat. Oh, how she wished she dared laugh!

She caught hold of a friendly branch, feeling the rough bark and soft leaves of a willow. Gentle tendrils curled around her face, the wind pressing them to her back. Another step brought her to a solid wall of stone. The wind howled.

Her fingers flew over the slippery rock in desperation. The sound of heavy footfalls had reached the top of the slope.

Not solid. There was a gap behind the trunk, just big enough. Sucking in her breath, the young queen slipped between stone and tree and into the empty space beyond. She huddled in the darkness amid the roots and cool damp earth as the voices of men and the clanking of swords and armour passed her hiding place, unaware. Only when the awful noise had ceased and the shadows had vanished did she dare draw breath.

_Thank you, friendly willow._ Lucy pressed her hands against the bark of the willow where it grew close to the stone and closed her eyes in relief.

If perhaps Lucy had not been Lucy and had instead been another young girl in this unfortunate situation, she might have been at a loss for what to do now that the danger seemed past. Another girl might have crept back out into the rain, or stayed shivering amid the roots and dirt until an answer presented itself. Fortunately for Lucy, she was actually herself and was rarely prone to inaction.

Feeling along the stone, she determined the cave went deeper than her arms could reach. Groping into the pocket of her schoolbag, she pulled out the new torch Edmund had given her that morning.

_"You'll need this for when you go sneaking through the halls at night, looking for adventure,"_ he'd teased her. She switched it on, the tiny soft light illuminating the damp stone and casting grasping shadows where roots poked through the exposed earth.

"It is much larger than I would have thought," Lucy mused to herself. "It isn't warm, and it's quite dark, but at least it is dry. It will have to do, Lucy! You can't go back outside, and if you dally here they're bound to come back and see the light, and that won't do at all."

Fixing the beam of her light into the darkness beyond, she boldly strode forward deeper into the narrow passage until the wind could not be felt and the air became heavy to breathe. It was then she noticed something that made her heart skip.

The fine, powdery dirt underfoot was covered with overlapping footprints. Most were animal, but some were distinctly not.

"There can be no doubt, these are Narnian footprints!" Lucy exclaimed. There were the marks of small sharp boots she was sure must have belonged to dwarfs, and many sets of small cloven hooves. At one time, true Narnians had been in this cave.

Lucy hurried on, shivering from excitement rather than cold. Narnia's youngest queen had come home, and there were things she needed to know.

On and on, through the twisting turns that went forward and back, until abruptly she came to what must be the centre. It was a tiny little alcove, bare and still, and it was apparent at once that the only creature to draw breath within was herself.

Her disappointment could not help but show as she stepped slowly into the little space, her shoes crunching on ancient leaves. This seemed as far as the passage went, and it was empty.

As the torch's light played across the bare wall, a shadow loomed abruptly before it and she jerked back in surprise. Was that a hand, reaching toward her? No, it did not move. She moved closer, her light straining steadily into the shadows of that lonely little corner. It _was_ a hand, the hand of a statue that sat crouched against the rough wall of the cave, its arm extended towards her.

The breath caught in Lucy's throat as the awful realization sank into her. The only stone statues she had ever seen in Narnia were during the reign of the White Witch.

With cold all the way to her fingertips, Lucy played the light across the little statue. Her heart ached even more when she saw it was a faun. He sat with his back against the stone, one hand pressed to it behind him, his shoulders bent as though he had run as far as he was able and could at last go no further, his other hand raised futilely to fend off his horrible, inevitable fate. Lucy felt tears in her eyes. Her very first friend in Narnia had been a faun.

"Poor, dear thing!" she whispered, turning the light away so she would not have to see the fear and pain on its face. "I wish stone could speak, then at least I could learn how you came here. The White Witch is long dead! How could this be?"

Weeping bravely, Lucy put out a hand to stroke the poor faun's curly stone hair. The statue was so old the stone felt rough and powdery beneath her fingertips. The Witch had indeed died long ago, and it seemed so too had this unfortunate creature.

As her fingers ran over the cold, lifeless stone, Lucy frowned through her tears. From the shadow on the wall, it looked as though the faun had been wearing something around his neck at the time of his awful petrification. A scarf of some sort.

It took a moment for Lucy to realize her breath had stopped. Slowly, ever so slowly, she lifted the light until it shone full on the stone face. The torch slipped from her fingers, clattering to roll against the wall.

There was a second when everything was still as the statue itself. Then, gently, she put out her hands to touch the face she had seen but for a moment, for the first time in so many years, and uttered the name that had haunted her thoughts since she was a child.

"Mr. Tumnus," she whispered, fresh tears spilling down her cheeks.

_**

* * *

Next ... Chapter 2: Of Queens and their Ways**  
In which our hero ruminates on the dilemma of breaking enchantments, and tests the auditory capacity of stone._


	2. Of Queens and Their Ways

**Chapter 2: Of Queens and their Ways**_  
In which our hero ruminates on the dilemma of breaking enchantments, and tests the auditory capacity of stone._

_............_

_Lucy's fingers trembled as she carefully saddled her horse. She was sixteen today, and all of Cair Paravel would celebrate the young queen's birthday the same way it had for the past eight years._

_Beside her, Ed carefully adjusted Phillip's bridle and flashed her a wide smile. "We'll find him this year, Lu," he said. "I just know it."_

_Lucy returned the smile, full of the same nervous excitement she felt every year. From across the courtyard, Susan's horn signalled the hunting party to mount and ride out._

_............_

Lucy crouched beside the statue, warming her frozen hands over the tiny fire that burned on the cave floor. Her wet shoes and socks lay drying near her crumpled red school blazer. The torch was on her lap, the casing scratched where it had hit the stone.

The young queen's tears had finally stilled, though the ache in her heart persisted. She had spilled her fresh grief at this discovery, and feeling even less desire to leave the cave now, had set about gathering as many dead dry roots as she could find and building a fire as near to the cold statue as she felt was comfortable.

She sat back barefoot in her blouse and skirt and wrapped her arms around her knees, looking at the stone figure that had once been her first Narnian friend. The firelight cast shadows that made his face a twisted, hurtful sight.

"I must commend you on your hiding place, my friend," she said quietly to the statue. "We searched all over Narnia for fifteen years, and here you were all along! Wherever 'here' might be," she added.

It wasn't hard to think of how he had come to be in this lonely place. She could see, behind her closed eyes, the poor faun fleeing the White Witch's servants, clambering desperately through the twisting tunnels only to reach the end and find himself trapped. And then the Witch herself, with her terrible crystal wand ...

Lucy shuddered and reached out to touch the faun's stone arm. "Jadis did find you after all, didn't she? When we learned you'd escaped the Lantern Waste, I'd so hoped ... but never mind," she said consolingly, as though the one to whom she spoke had ears of flesh and not stone. "What's done is done. I have found you now, and now I must decide what to do."

She rested her chin on her arms, and then all at once the long, long day came tumbling back to her. The station in London where each of the others boarded their separate trains, first Peter, then Susan and finally Edmund, until Lucy was standing there alone amidst the crowd, feeling very unsure about everything. The tug from somewhere deep inside her that sent the walls crumbling away and left her standing on the warm beach, still alone and afraid yet delighted beyond belief.

The walk up the river, the men in the boat, the dash through the trees and into the forest. The rain, the cave. Tumnus.

"You know what this means?" Lucy murmured. "If you're here, then I really have come back. It isn't a dream, I would never dream such a thing." Her eyes unexpectedly clouded. "But why haven't the others come too? First I must go off to school all on my own, and now I must come here alone as well?" To her dismay she began sniffling again, and hurriedly wiped her eyes on her sleeve. "Oh no, Lucy, no blubbering! You're in Narnia and you're a queen again now, so act like it!"

She leaned against Tumnus' statue, squeezing her eyes closed to the cool stone on her cheek. It was so dry and dusty, not like the statues in the Witch's castle, who stood glistening with melted ice as though they had already begun to thaw, needing only Aslan's breath to wake them.

"Aslan," Lucy murmured against the stone. "Aslan, Aslan. Where are you?"

Her mind's eye returned to the great tawny Lion as he'd been in Jadis' half-melted palace, breathing stone into flesh before her eyes. Her hopeful and futile hunt for the fate of her dearest friend had begun on that day. Aslan had come one year on her birthday, their very last year in Narnia, and had indulged the young queen with a cryptic answer to her question of _Will I find him, Aslan? When?_

_When it most behooves you to do so, Daughter of Eve._

"I suppose that would have to be now," Lucy said softly, opening her eyes. "But what am I to do with you? I can't take you anywhere with me like this, and without Aslan ..." she trailed off, and for a long while there was only silence and the crackling of the fire. It was so small, a tiny light in the vast darkness of the little cavern, as though it were all that kept her from being engulfed. Her fingers ran absently over the rough stone fur of her once-kidnapper and dear friend, and her heart felt as though it were sinking into the pit of her stomach. For the first time she could remember, Lucy felt utterly lonely.

And then a memory floated up to dance behind her eyes, as the fire had danced when Tumnus had played the lullaby for her those many years ago. He had been trying to lull her to sleep to kidnap her, but that had never mattered afterwards. The fiery dancers had swept through her dreams for many years, and she often found herself humming the haunting tune, as though trying to call back whatever magic he had unleashed on her.

"Magic," Lucy murmured to herself. She sat up a straighter, as though hearing someone call for her. "There is magic here in Narnia, even when Aslan is gone and the trees are asleep, even when it has been winter for a hundred years! There was magic in your pipes, and in Susan's horn, and the Lamppost and the Wardrobe, and there must still be magic or I would not be here now."

She stood up now, beginning to pace as well as she could in the small space. "Perhaps there _is _something I can do on my own," she said, beginning to become excited. "In all the stories I have read, enchantments can be broken by perfectly ordinary people. Well," she amended, tapping Ed's torch in her palm, "usually it's a prince or a princess, or a little boy in rags, or even a talking animal, but we haven't any of those here and now. There's just you and I ... and I'm a queen, which is much better than a princess, I should think."

By this point, she had nearly forgotten the statue could not hear or speak, and glanced at it as if for approval. The stone face had of course remained unchanged, but she almost imagined she could see his quizzical expression, one eyebrow and one furry ear cocked in curiosity as she spoke.

"Now," Lucy continued, crossing her arms, "there are a number of ways to break an enchantment, or so I believe. There are magic words," she ticked off one finger, "but I'm afraid I don't know any. There's also a potion or a ring or magic bauble of some sort, none of which I have ..." she stopped, her thoughts have come full circle to where she knew they would, and she came to stand before the statue again. "I suspect you know where this is going, don't you?"

Smoothing her skirt, she knelt down until she was face to face with the stone faun. Biting her lip, she took his face in her hands and brushed back the stone hair which, of course, did not move.

"Now, you mustn't think me too forward for this," she said nervously, "and you must promise not to laugh if it doesn't work!"

Steeling herself, she leaned forward and pressed her lips to the cold stone, just beneath the curve of his cheek. She lingered there, eyes closed, and hardly dared to breathe for a very long and very still moment, until finally it became apparent that nothing was going to happen.

Lucy stayed where she was, her cheek pressed to the stone, and let fresh tears fall onto the statue. She hadn't realized they'd been there, waiting behind her eyes, but she thought it best to let them go with dignity. "I feel horribly foolish," she whispered. "Please forgive me. It's just been _such_ a day."

She smoothed away where her tears had stained the dusty stone, the wetness shining on his cheeks as though he too had been crying.

"It was worth a try," she said wearily, sitting back down beside him. "And now I'm back to the beginning, and I still must decide what I'm to do."

Sighing softy, Lucy draped an arm over Tumnus' leg as though it were the arm of a throne, and tapped Ed's torch in her hand as she would have a sceptre. She pursed her lips in the frown she made when considering a dilemma, which schoolteachers and courtiers alike had called adorable, until it was aimed at them.

"There's nothing for it," she said finally. "I cannot stay here with you, my friend. I've come back to Narnia alone, and I must find out why. No, don't look at me like that," she said sternly, in the same voice she had often used on Susan's cat. "You know it must be. I will go, and I will find Aslan. Don't worry," she smiled at the frozen face and smoothed the curve of his cheek again, feeling greatly eased. "I _will_ come back for you."

She kissed him again quickly, a child's kiss to seal a promise. Then she tucked her rolled-up jacket against the faun's leg and curled up against him to sleep.

............

_Lucy was standing on the beach near Cair Paravel, looking out into the pale morning sun. Gentle waves soaked the hem of her skirt, and she felt the delicate weight of her silver laurel-leaf crown on her brow. It seemed heavier than she thought it should._

_Hearing the gentle sound of large, heavy paws padding in the wet sand she turned expectantly, but all she saw were the trees along the shore dancing slowly back and forth. She watched as they trembled and became still. Cold wind blew through her hair, smelling of dust._

_Turning back to the beach, she found it had changed. Before her there was now an island towering across a wide channel, and from its peak jutted the jagged spires of broken columns._

_As she took a step forward, a faint rumbling echoed in her ears, becoming louder and louder._

............

Lucy woke to perfect and utter darkness, and for a moment could not remember where she was. Then she sat up too quickly and knocked her head on Tumnus' arm, and realized her fire had gone out while she slept.

Fumbling around for Ed's torch, she finally found it had rolled under the statue's leg. It seemed to work alright even after having been dropped, and the light was enough to gather up her things and stamp out the stray embers in the ashes of her fire. She busied herself packing and repacking her school bag, until at last she felt there wasn't anything more that could to be done here, and finally turned to face her friend.

"It'll be alright, really," she assured him, blinking back the sting in her eyes. "I'll only be gone a moment."

Giving his dusty hair a last, friendly pat, she slung her bag over her shoulder and turned to leave. Her heart heavy, she walked down the narrow passage without looking back.

The tunnel did not seem nearly as long walking the way back, and it was only moments before she saw daylight ahead though the crack around the willow. Hurrying forward, she stowed the torch in her bag and slipped through the opening, giving the friendly willow a pat as she did.

The light outside was not bright enough to be full day, but still made her blink and shade her eyes. As she emerged from around the tree, rough hands grabbed her from behind and a leather glove clamped over her mouth.

Her shriek muffled, Lucy stamped her foot down blindly as she was dragged backwards only to connect with the wet leaves underfoot, but it was enough to throw her attacker off balance. The hand slipped from her face, and she let out a shrill cry and lashed out behind her with fists and feet.

"Stop that, stupid girl!" Hands seized her ankles and she kicked and struggled in vain as her first assailant grabbed her by the wrists. Both men wore tarnished armour over black leather and carried straight swords, and they were both much larger and stronger than she. It was only a moment before they had wrestled her to the ground, writhing and shrieking angrily.

They laughed at her efforts, pinning her like a struggling rabbit. "Did not think we could find your tracks in the daylight, did you?" One of them, the one who had her wrists, said in a thickly accented voice. An accent she recognized.

_Telmarines!_ In her surprise she stopped shrieking for an instant. Telmar lay beyond the border of the Western Woods, and rarely did anybody venture into Narnia from there. These men were clearly soldiers. What were they doing so near the coast?

"This is your forest spy, Gueraz?" the other said angrily, tightening his grips on her ankles as he dodged a clumsy kick. He had a long scar down the side of his face that pulled it into a perpetual sneer. "You fool! We spent half the night in these godforsaken woods, chasing down a little girl!"

"What is this she is wearing?" the first asked, tugging at the sleeve of Lucy' jacket. "I've never seen such garments."

"Never mind!" Scarface snapped. "We left the dwarf in the boat! Miraz will have our heads if we do not finish him. Slit her throat and let's be done with it!"

The sound of a dagger being drawn sent Lucy's shrieks into a higher pitch, and her struggles became desperate. She felt the cold steel against her neck and shut her eyes, her teeth clenched and her heels digging into the soft ground.

There was a horrible moment when she felt the knife begin to slide, and then suddenly it was gone and she found herself tumbling over in the leaves as the grip on her wrists was violently ripped away. All she saw was a flash of red, and when she lifted her head the two soldiers were running and stumbling away through the trees as if for their very lives.

Gingerly lifting herself off the ground, Lucy bit back a grimace of pain and shakily slid her feet back under her. Her head throbbing, she turned to look behind her, and promptly forgot how to breathe.

Collapsed in the roots of the willow, his red scarf hanging askew around his shoulders, gasping heavily and looking for all the world like he was frightened to death, was Tumnus.

Lucy let out a strangled cry and rushed toward her friend. The faun skittered back, scrambling for purchase against the tree, his cloven hooves slipping on the wet leaves. He was trembling so hard he kept sliding down the willow's trunk, his blue eyes wide as milk-saucers.

Stopping short, Lucy stood still a moment before sinking back down to the ground. Holding out her hand, she inched slowly toward the terrified faun. "Tumnus?" she said softly, hardly daring to speak. His breathing slowed visibly at the sound of his name, but still he stared at her with wide, frightened eyes. "Mr. Tumnus, it's me. It's Lucy Pevensie."

Slowly, his breathing evened and his body unstiffened against the tree. He peered at her, his eyes narrowing, and she waited, holding her breath, as he searched her face. Then slowly, ever so slowly, he reached out and touched the tip of one finger to her nose.

"Lucy?" he whispered.

Ignoring the faun's strangled gasp, the queen of Narnia threw her arms around her friend's neck and buried her face into his tattered scarf. "Tumnus!" she sobbed. "Oh, Tumnus!"

_

* * *

** What happened? Was Aslan there, or was Lucy's kiss just a slow-acting phoenix-down? And what the heck is going on, anyway? The world may never know! **_

_**Next ... Chapter 3: Memories in Ruin**__  
In which our heroes make a startling discovery, and talk at length about apples._


	3. Memories in Ruin

**Chapter 3: Memories in Ruin  
**_In which our heroes make a startling discovery, and talk at great length about apples._

Their boat drifted along with the current, rocking slightly as Lucy shifted in her seat. She held the oars above the water, gripping them loosely in her small hands, but otherwise let the boat go along as it willed. The river was wide and clear, the current smooth and steady, and having walked along it the day before she knew it was so all the way to the coast.

Tumnus sat by the rudder, though there was little need to steer. He didn't look to be at all comfortable with the boat. His hooves tapped restlessly on the wooden floor and he seemed unable to decide which side of the river he should be looking at as they floated down it.

A sudden thought occurred to her. "Are you hungry?" she asked, digging into her schoolbag and pulling out a paper-covered sandwich. She unwrapped it and broke it in half, offering him the larger piece, and jumped when he snatched it out of her hand and began stuffing it into his mouth. He caught her shocked expression and blushed to the tips of his ears.

Swallowing hurriedly, he managed an awkward smile. "Sorry."

"It's alright," she said, still surprised. "You can have the rest, if you like."

He shook his head politely, and with some effort managed to eat a little more slowly. Lucy took even longer with hers, in case he changed his mind about wanting it, but he only turned his eyes back to trees around them. He seemed a bit better for having eaten and Lucy watched him happily, feeling his quiet awe as though it were her own.

He had returned her embrace beneath the willow. It had taken a moment, but then they were holding each other tightly while they half-laughed, half-wept in disbelief, until they finally managed to untangle themselves. He tried to wipe her cheeks with his scarf and she pulled out a handkerchief, and they both started laughing so hard that fresh tears poured down their faces and they collapsed in a heap together at the foot of the tree.

It was when their giddy mirth finally subsided that Tumnus seemed to notice the forest for the first time. He dug his fingers into the carpet of leaves and moss around the willow's roots, as though it were something beautiful and alien, and looked up at its gently waving branches.

"Summer," he whispered, placing his hand on the willow's trunk and standing so the leafy tendrils trailed across his face. He looked at Lucy with hope and disbelief. "Summer, in Narnia?"

She pressed her lips together and nodded, her eyes sparkling.

"Then ..." his own eyes lit up like the sky. "The Witch ... is dead?"

Lucy's smile bubbled up uncontrollably. "Dead and gone," she pronounced loudly, grinning from ear to ear.

With a whoop of laughter he grabbed her hands and began to swing her around and around. They danced ring-around-the-rosy amid the trees, singing out "She's dead! She's gone!", which Lucy turned into "Ding-dong, the Witch is dead!", until they collapsed with dizziness on the grass, giggling breathlessly. Tumnus sat up and shook the leaves out of his curly hair. He met her eyes and grew suddenly sober.

"You're so much older," he said quietly, taking her in for the first time. "Has it really been so long?"

She smiled, a little sadly. "Longer than you think." She reached for his hand, and as they stood up together she realized his right cheek was swollen and bruised and there was dried blood in his tousled hair. With horror, she saw that the tips of his small curved horns, where they'd once poked through the hair, were jaggedly broken off.

Alarmed, she reached out to touch them and he caught her hand in his own. Smiling awkwardly, he managed a shrug. "It's not so bad," he assured her, squeezing her fingers. "Not now, anyway."

"Was it awful?" Lucy asked in a whisper, biting her lip in sorrow.

"I ..." shaking his head, he surprised her by quickly kissing her hand. "It doesn't matter, Lucy Pevensie," he said firmly. Smiling earnestly at her, he swung their hands together the way he'd done when they'd first met, and she found herself remembering how small her hand had once been within his, and how very tall he'd seemed to her that day under the lamppost.

"Lucy?"

Tumnus' voice snapped her out of her reverie. Blinking, she took in the water sloshing alongside the boat and the quiet trees drifting past, and the faun in the red scarf gazing at her curiously from the other seat.

Tumnus tilted his head, an eyebrow raised and one ear cocked. "I said, why are we going downriver toward the sea? Oughtn't we to be heading upriver instead?"

She smiled sweetly at him. "Would you like to row?"

His glower brought peals of laughter from her. They had found the Telmarines' boat nestled up against the shore not far from the cave and Tumnus had flatly refused to let her row it, insisting that he knew how. It appeared he was mistaken, for on the first pull he swung the oar back too quickly. The blade skipped along the water and the handle smacked him soundly in the forehead. Lucy had managed to turn her burst of laughter into an appropriately horrified gasp and jumped up at once, but he gruffly waved off her attentions and, blushing furiously, let her take the seat without complaint.

She sobered quickly, not wanting to embarrass him further. "We're going downriver," she told him, "because I think there is something there I need to see." She began to tell him of the dream she'd had when she slept beneath his statue the night before.

"When I turned back, I was where I'd come out from the train station," she explained. "The channel and the island were the same, only ... I noticed something else. There were some kind of ruins all over it. I think it may be important."

She caught him mouthing the words "train station", marvelling at yet more Spare Oom vocabulary. He coughed quickly. "Mightn't it just have been a dream?"

She frowned and pursed her lips in thought. "No, I don't think so," she began, and stopped. Would he think her foolish if she said she thought the dream came from Aslan? He was looking at her curiously again, waiting for her to continue.

"Tell me something," she said instead, sitting up. "Did you ... did you see anyone, when you woke up?"

His eyebrows scrunched. "No," he said slowly. "No, I don't think so. I felt ... cold all over, and then it was as if I was melting from the inside out, and suddenly I was lying there in the dark. Then I heard you screaming, and ..." he smiled nervously and scrubbed at his cheek. "I think I knew it was you, but I ... I really don't remember anything."

Lucy felt a twisting in the pit of her stomach. He hadn't been there when Aslan had woken the statues in Jadis' palace. He couldn't know the Lion was the only one who could have undone the White Witch's magic. She felt she should tell him, but ... but why hadn't he shown himself? Why leave the faun alone in the dark cave, with nary a word or a growl to warn her? If not for the two Telmarine soldiers, she might have simply walked away and never known he was alive again.

"Lucy? Is everything alright?" Tumnus hand on hers interrupted her thoughts. She managed a smile.

"It's a good a place to go as any," she said, turning back to their original conversation. "Unless you object?"

He smiled warmly and patted her hand. "All places are good to me now, Lucy Pevensie."

His blue eyes were lovely, she realized, and felt her heart flutter like a bird in her chest. Her face grew hot, and she began rowing furiously in an attempt to distract herself.

............

The sun was high by the time they reached the coast, and the island loomed over them like a sleeping giant. Lucy paddled the boat across the channel to the stretch of smooth beach and together they managed to drag it out of the water. Tumnus looked with awe over the expanse of white sand and beyond it, to the glittering open water.

"I've never been to the sea before," he said in a hushed voice, blinking at the brightly reflected sunlight.

"We used to live near the sea," Lucy said softly, half to herself, as she looked longingly past him. "I've missed it so."

"What does one ... _do_ here?" he wondered aloud.

Without hesitation, Lucy peeled off her shoes and stockings and ran across the beach to the ocean beyond. Tumnus' hooves were ill-suited to navigate the beach, slipping and sinking clumsily in the loose sand as he hurried after her. She ploughed into the surf, laughing in delight, with Tumnus stumbling along with her. She splashed him mercilessly, becoming quite sodden herself in the process, until they were both soaked and sputtering.

Tumnus spat out a mouthful of water. "It really is salty!" he exclaimed. "I never actually believed that ... Lucy?"

Lucy had stopped their play and was staring up the cliff face before them. "See?" she said, pointing. "There in the trees, those broken stones. What do you supposed that is?"

He followed her gaze, wringing out his drooping scarf. "It looks like a wall, perhaps," he said.

She nodded and began to wade back onto the beach. Leaving her shoes where they lay in the boat, she crossed the sand toward where the cliff met the beach. After a moment, Tumnus slogged out behind her with water dripping from his furry shanks, muttering that he could do without the stinging.

It didn't take them long to find a way up, for it seemed a part of the cliff had been carved away for just that purpose, revealing a badly water-worn staircase cut into the rock. It was rather high above the beach, as if a great deal of sand had washed away since then, and she needed Tumnus to give her a boost up to it. The faun clambered easily up after her and for a moment she envied his goat-like legs and sure footing.

It was a difficult climb. The steps were worn smooth in some places, and broken almost completely off in others. The staircase wound around the cliff, facing out to the ocean, and as they climbed Lucy felt a niggling sense of familiarity in the back of her mind. She heard Tumnus muttering to himself behind her and saw that the faun was otherwise occupied, trying with some difficulty to tap out the sand that had stuck between his cloven hooves. Smiling to herself and deciding she did not envy him so much after all, she brushed the feeling away and kept climbing.

Nearer to the top the way became easier to navigate, though they were both tired and thirsty by the time they reached the last stair. The steps spilled out onto a broad grassy plateau and there they could see the remains of the wall Lucy had pointed out from the beach, crumbled and broken in several places. Growing right up against it were dozens of enormous apple trees.

Tumnus let out a shout of delight and sprang toward the nearest one, clambering up into the branches as though he were part squirrel instead of part goat. With his red scarf amid the leaves he looked as though he might have grown there himself.

"I haven't seen apples in a hundred years!" he cried, jumping back to the ground with two of the red fruit in hand. He bit into one in ecstasy, the juice running down his chin, and offered the other to her.

Lucy laughed at his exuberance and took the apple, biting it a little more daintily. The fruit was sweet and ripe, and felt wonderful on her parched throat. The sandwich they'd shared had been over an hour ago, and she was quietly relieved that at least there was more food here.

They climbed through a crumbled section of the wall, gathering more apples from the ground as they went. The ruins sprawled over more ground than Lucy had imagined and it was difficult to make any sense of, as most of the remains stood little more than twice her height and a great deal looked to have been partly buried over time. Every so often, however, there was a doorway still with a decorated arch, a sweeping staircase or part of a flying buttress that hinted at the grandeur this lonely place might once have boasted.

"It's funny," she remarked, trailing her hand over the pitted surface of a marble column, "but I don't remember any ruins like this in Narnia before."

Tumnus shrugged, biting into another apple. "Narnia has a great many secrets," he said. "Perhaps this is just one more."

He seemed remarkably devil-may-care, but Lucy let it be. He had only been awake a few hours, after all, and she shuddered to think what his last days alive might have been like. His swollen cheek was already turning a purplish blue ... the wound must have been quite fresh.

They began to wander separately, staying reasonably in sight of one another. The ruins were strangely peaceful, having that quiet ageless feel that old places always have, as though time and care simply left you alone while you walked within. Lucy had gotten that feeling before in some parks in London, where dense foliage overgrew old statuary leaving the impression that time had forgotten it.

"Who do you suppose lived here?" Tumnus asked after a while.

Lucy, whose neck was craning to examine a tripartite doorway with the same odd feeling she'd had before, felt her foot hit an object partly buried in the soft earth underfoot. It wasn't a rock; she'd felt a peculiar resonance the moment her bare toe had touched it. Reaching down, she pulled away a tangle of creepers and extracted the thing from the dirt.

It was a small figurine carved entirely out of clear crystal, no bigger than her little finger, of a woman in flowing robes and a delicate crown.

A memory hit Lucy so strongly that for a moment, she could almost feel the heat of a roaring fire next to her and the taste of hot cider on her tongue.

_"Checkmate, Peter!" she cried triumphantly, placing the Queen at his end of the board and grinning triumphantly._

_The High King of Narnia let out a bewildered sigh and threw up his hands in defeat. "Susan told me getting you your own set would be trouble. How _do_ you keep beating me the same way?"_

_Lucy stood up to kiss her big brother on the cheek. "To use the Queen, you have to _be_ the Queen," she said smugly. "And that, dear brother, is an advantage I shall always have over you."_

The crunch of an apple brought her crashing back to the present. She gave a little gasp and turned her head, half to keep herself from falling over.

"What's that?" Tumnus peered over her shoulder with interest at the crystal Queen.

"It's mine," she said softly, closing her fingers around the familiar figure. "At least, it used to be."

He feet seemed to move of their own accord, hurrying her past the doorway she'd been inspecting. Her heart was pounding in her ears, as though the sea were tugging at the blood in her veins with each pull of the waves.

"This was a ballroom," she heard herself saying. "There were alcoves there, and the balconies opened onto the sea." She hurried on, barely aware of the faun following after her in alarm. "The banquet hall was adjacent ... there were suits of armour along the wall."

She dashed past a rusted metal arm sticking out of the ground. Her mouth was dry as dust, and memories flooded before her eyes with every step. The courtyard, with its elaborate fountain. The rampart leading to the foyer ... not stairs, but a slope smooth enough for a centaur's gait. Rushing through the remains of a doorway twelve feet wide, she stopped abruptly. Tumnus skidded to keep from crashing into her, dropping a few apples to the grass as he did so.

Lucy didn't seem to notice him anymore. She began to walk slowly forward between two rows of broken columns, and it was as though she had briefly stepped into another world: her bearing changed, her back became straighter and her head bent as though it held some weight upon it. The faun followed her tentatively, confused by his friend's strange behaviour.

When she reached a weathered stone dais at the end of the path she turned back to him, and Tumnus paused in his steps at the power of the memories that shone in her eyes.

"Lucy, what is it? What's wrong?" he asked, frightened by this change in her.

"This is," she whispered. "Don't you see it?"

He shook his head. "No, I don't," he said desperately. "What is this place?"

She pointed to the dais, where the remains of four raised seats had long since crumbled away. "These are the Four Thrones of Narnia," she said, her voice painfully distant. "This is Cair Paravel."

_

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** An imaginary Mr. Tumnus plushie to anyone who didn't see that coming ...**_

**_Next ... Chapter 4: Through the Eyes of Statues_  
**_In which some discomfort is to be had, and our heroes come to a decision regarding the current state of affairs._


	4. Through the Eyes of Statues

_A big thanks to everyone who reads and reviews ... one review makes the next chapter all the easier to write! Big thanks especially to unicorn-skydancer08, who's given me lovely support. Also, if you have questions or just want to have a conversation, pop into my forum!_

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**Chapter 4: Through the Eyes of Statues  
**_In which some discomfort is to be had, and our heroes come to a decision regarding the current state of affairs._

Tumnus barked a nervous laugh. "Lucy, my father visited Cair Paravel once," he said, trying to reassure her. "It isn't a ruin."

"It wasn't when we lived here either," she said softly. She walked up the pitted, lichen-covered steps and placed her hand on the leftmost heap of weathered stone. "We ruled here for fifteen years, before Aslan called us home."

The faun stood silently, gazing slowly around as though trying to see what she saw. "I don't understand," he said finally.

Lucy knelt before the leftmost throne, and whatever strangeness had come over her seemed to vanish in the next breath. She stood up and took Tumnus' hand. "I know," she said. "Come, and I'll show you."

She led him past the dais and through the ruins as though a path had been laid out before her. The sleepy curiosity that had come upon first exploring the place with her had vanished and Tumnus felt a sense of unwelcome apprehension. Whatever this place really was, there was a piece of her here, a memory to which he was not privy, and that unsettled the faun more deeply than the length of time he might have been sleeping in stone.

She stopped before a facade of marble pillars around a small niche. "Help me with this," she told him, pushing against one of the pillars.

Wondering if she might not be slightly mad, the faun added his strength to hers and to his surprise the wall actually began to slide away, revealing a rotted wooden door behind it. Lucy pulled at the handle and it crumbled to dust in her fingers. The wood was so decayed it fell away with little resistance.

Lucy reached into the leather bag she had slung over her shoulder and pulled out a curious silver object that flared at one end. Tumnus let out a yelp when she flicked a switch and soft yellow light shone out of it.

Laughing at the faun's startled reaction, Lucy handed the torch to him. He took it reverently, blinking when he pointed it at his face. He turned it to the dark passage before them, delighted as the light played over the winding staircase within. "Is it ... magic?" he asked in awe.

Lucy smiled at him, her cheek dimpling in amusement. "The closest Spare Oom has to offer. Come," she tugged on his arm and he followed her, dutifully holding the light before him.

The stairs descended only a few turns into the earth before the light was no longer needed. Sunlight fell in cascades through gaps in the stone overhead, illuminating the cavern within.

Lucy let out a gasp of joy. "It's all still here!" she exclaimed, hurrying down the stairs.

"It", Tumnus thought as he looked over the broken railing at the room below, could only be the heaps of glittering treasure that spilled over the floor and lay scattered in every corner. But Lucy ran past all of that without a glance, her attention focussed on something by the far wall. Tumnus quickly hurried after her, pushing past the iron gate at the bottom of the stairs.

"Lucy?"

He followed the prints her bare feet had left in the dust, barely glancing at the piles of dusty relics; such things held little interest for a faun beyond passing curiosity. Lucy had once again enshrouded herself in the mantle of another time. Sunlight turned her hair auburn, ringing her with an ethereal light as she stood before four larger-than-life statues, each set in an enclave behind a stone chest.

Tumnus stepped quietly beside her, his hooves hardly daring to disturb the dust. She raised her arm, indicating the figures before them. The statues were of four humans, two men and two women, in regal clothing with crowns on their heads.

"This was us," she said. "Peter, Susan, Edmund and I. The Four Kings and Queens of Narnia."

The only statues Tumnus had ever seen had been the ugly grey reminders of the White Witch's fury that had dotted the forest around the Lantern Waste. These were of pure white marble, artful and serene. Their faces were kind and solemn, except for the one queen who had a joyous smile across her pretty features. Tumnus couldn't seem to take his eyes off her.

"'When Adam's flesh and Adam's bone ...'" he murmured without quite realizing. The old rhyme had been in his thoughts the day he'd seen Lucy off at the lamppost, but the belief of it ever coming to pass had frozen away after a hundred years of winter.

"'...Sits in Cair Paravel in throne, the evil time will be over and done.'" Lucy went to stand before the statue of the laughing Queen. She smiled and shrugged. "Mr. Beaver told us that, when we all came to Narnia together. We really had no idea about anything, then."

The faun's eyes flew between the girl and the joyfully smiling queen with a moment of supreme revelation. "Then ... this is _you_?"

Lucy threw back her head and struck a pose. "Queen Lucy the Valiant," she said in a bold, throaty voice. A smile crept over her face, matching that of the marble statue, and she dissolved into giggles.

Tumnus' eyes were locked on the stone face. "You're ... lovely," he whispered without thinking.

Lucy laughed and he blushed for what seemed like the tenth time that day. She paid him no mind for his slip of the tongue and opened the stone chest at the foot of her statue. Pulling out a dress of rosy-gold satin, she held it up to her and laughed again.

"Look! I was so tall!" the hem of the dress bunched on the ground, even with the neckline at eye level. The Lucy who would have worn it would have been inches taller than Tumnus.

The faun shuffled over to sit on a pile of gilded armour, somehow untarnished after its long rest in the vault. He felt lightheaded and wished he hadn't left his apples on the grass by the thrones. The marble statues continued to stare at him, as though wondering why he sat in their presence. Should he stand again? Lucy seemed to have forgotten he was there, intent on what she was finding in the chest. Her statue smiled down on her, as though amused by the antics of her younger self.

Tumnus had recognized the girl under the willow tree as his Lucy, older to be sure, but with the same laughing eyes and sweet freckles and that peculiar little upturned nose. The beautiful statue before him with her flowing robes and delicate crown was in every way a noble woman. And yet she was there, his Lucy, in the eyes and face and something much deeper that left no doubt: the young girl in the drab grey skirt and the beautiful Queen were one and the same.

He shifted in his seat and barely caught a round shield, covered in dust, before it clattered to the floor. He idly blew the dust off it, revealing the roaring face of a lion embossed in gold on the shield's front. He hastily set it aside, face down, and sought to find somewhere else to rest his eyes.

Lucy's hand on his shoulder made him jump to his hooves. Without thinking he tried to bow and lost his balance, and she caught his arm just before he went tumbling backwards into the the pile of armour.

"Let's go," she said, when he'd righted himself. "It doesn't feel right, to be here without the others."

Her small arms were wrapped around a bundle of green and blue fabric, which she was hugging close to her chest. She looked small and sad and not at all queenly, and without thinking he tucked an arm around her shoulders. She leaned into him gratefully, and together they walked back to the iron gate.

Tumnus cast a glance behind him, but instead of the smiling Queen his eyes fell on the proud-shouldered statue of King Peter, whose solemn bearded face regarded him with what the faun thought could only be disapproval.

............

Twilight found Tumnus lying on the grass beneath the apple trees, outside the crumbling wall and ruined castle. As happy as he had been with Lucy beneath the trees and on the beach, the day's end left him terribly melancholy, and not without reason.

A day ago he hadn't seen green grass or trees or apples in a hundred years. A day ago Lucy Pevensie had been a child, and they had met but twice. A day ago, he had thought for certain he was going to die.

Caught, held down and beaten, his horns hacked off, and then ... In the warm sunlight, amid the trees and the laughter of his dear Lucy it had seemed but a horrible dream, fast fading and quickly dismissed.

Now, in the blink of an eye, everything had changed. Of course time had passed while he was a statue. Lucy was years older now. This didn't bother him so much; it was to be expected after all, and could hardly be helped. But she had lived a lifetime in Narnia, and Narnia had lived an age while he slept in stone. Everyone he had ever known had to be long dead by now, while to him only a moment had gone by. He no longer knew where he belonged anymore.

Lucy came from around the wall, wearing the green dress she'd taken from the chest beneath her statue. "All done," she announced. She set her drab Spare Oom clothes on the ground and came to sit beside him.

Even in the fading light, the change was remarkable. She looked even older than before, and though the dress was nothing like a queenly robe, she resembled her statue all the more. Tumnus sat up, putting a little space between them. It was only proper, after all.

Lucy looked at him worriedly. "Are you alright, Tumnus?"

He tried to hide his slight flinch, but he was sure his ears betrayed him. She had only ever called him "Mr. Tumnus" before, an epithet that had amused and endeared him to a sweet child. Now she was a Queen, and he was just "Tumnus".

"I'm alright," was all he said.

She smiled and closed the distance, folding her slender arms around his own. "Today has been hard for both of us, dear friend," she said comfortingly, stroking the fur on his elbow. "Tomorrow will likely be no better, but at least we'll leave this place."

"We will?" he turned his head around quickly. "I ... I mean, do we have to?" he stammered, twisting his scarf in his hands. "It's just that ... we've only just arrived. We're safe here ... we have food ..."

Lucy's delicate eyebrows furrowed for a heartbeat before her face softened. "I'd forgotten," she said, squeezing his arm. "You were on the run."

Tumnus looked away and didn't say anything in return. He felt utterly foolish and didn't want to make it any worse. Lucy did not need to be burdened with troubles that were, it seemed clear, ancient history.

The young queen only let go his arm and raised herself up on her knees. She took a bottle of something from a pouch on her belt and pulled out the stopper. A wonderful smell filled the air between them.

"Open your mouth," she ordered.

He stared, dumbfounded. Was that a command? What on earth was in that bottle? He felt nervous fear well up at yet another something that was new and unknown.

Lucy, Queen Lucy, only tilted her head patiently. "You don't trust me?" she asked, amused.

That wasn't true at all. With a sigh, he closed his eyes and tilted his head back. A drop of something fell onto his tongue and the taste of everything wonderful filled his mouth: fresh tea with honey and toast with jam, sugar cakes topped with strawberries and roasted apples. It lasted only a second and he savoured it longingly before opening his eyes.

He saw Lucy peering at him, a secret smile on her lips. For a moment he couldn't imagine why, until he noticed the stiffness in his jaw had vanished. Putting a hand to his cheek, he realized it was no longer swollen and tender, and the bruises half-hidden by the fur on his chest were fading before his eyes. His hands flew of their own own accord to his horns, only to find them still jagged stumps.

Lucy bit her lip in regret. "I don't think it does that."

Lowering his hands quickly, he managed a laugh. "You are a marvel, Lucy Pevensie," he said quietly, then blushed at his forwardness. "I mean ... Queen Lucy, I suppose it is?"

She only shook her head a little and put the bottle away. Sighing deeply, Lucy flopped onto her back in the grass and stretched, digging her fingers into the soft dirt. After a moment he lay back on his elbows and craned his head back, watching the sky as twilight deepened and the stars began to show themselves, one by one.

"Look," Lucy raised a hand to point at the sky. "It's the Leopard. Do you see?"

He smiled, finally a real true smile, and sank down into the grass beside her. Other constellations began to appear, ones he had known all his life from many a summer's evening stretched out on the grass in the Western Woods. "The Ship," he pointed, "and the Spearhead." His hand brushed hers and he quickly let it drop back to the grass.

She moved so that her head touched his shoulder, their bodies making a "L" on the grass together. "I used to lay out here every night it was warm enough," she murmured. "The year before we left, the moles planted this orchard. Pomona herself came to bless the trees for us. I don't doubt that is why they're still here."

"Pomona," Tumnus echoed the familiar name. The Tree Lady had been considered the greatest of all the woods-people, and in his wayward adolescence he'd been utterly besotted with her. It had been quite unrequited, of course, but the memory warmed him nonetheless.

Lucy twined her fingers around his, pulling him quite abruptly back to the present. "We didn't mean to leave," she said quietly, holding his hand where it lay in the grass. "We'd been kings and queens so long we'd forgotten we'd ever been anything else. Then one day ..."

She trailed off, and Tumnus didn't press. He didn't think he could have found his voice to do so if he'd wanted. He stared fixedly at the stars and waving apple boughs overhead and tried to quell the strange and unsettling warmth that seemed to have sprung into his chest. He could feel the wetness of tears where her cheek touched his bare shoulder.

"Time is different in on the other side," she said at last. "Every time I've come and gone, it was as if only a moment passed. When we emerged from the wardrobe, we were children again. And I've waited ... I've waited for so long to come back, and now that I have ..."

She squeezed his fingers, making his heart jump a little. "I have to find out what has happened here," she said firmly. "I must know why I've been called back. Will you help me, Tumnus?"

Tumnus swallowed hard, his mouth very dry. "I will ... your Majesty."

She shook her head, her hair tumbling over his shoulder. "Only Lucy to you, dear friend," she murmured. "Only ever Lucy to you."

The warmth in his chest seemed to spread to the ends of his fingertips, and bravely he curled his own hand around hers. She nestled her head into the crook of his shoulder, pressing her cheek into his red scarf, and was asleep before long.

Tumnus lay there until dawn, the threads of his scarf wafting in the night breeze and Lucy's breath, the cool grass on his back and her warm hand in his, and the face of a marble statue hovering just before his eyes.

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**_Next ... Chapter 5: How They Left the Island_  
**_In which our heroes strike out for parts unknown, with many cumbersome items and an infusion of courage._


	5. How They Left the Island

_Man, this is the longest one yet. I promise, something exciting actually happens in this part ... as always, thanks for your reviews! Today's mystery hint is brought to you by red scarves._

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**Chapter 5: How They Left the Island  
**_In which our heroes strike out for parts unknown, with many cumbersome items and and infusion of courage._

Lucy woke far too early for her liking, and as is normal when one spends the night outside on the ground she found herself unwilling to return to sleep. After a brief battle with her eyelids, she opened them and rolled over.

Tumnus was gone.

Oddly, this didn't bother Lucy as much as she might have thought, the faun being her only companion as it was. She couldn't conceive of him having gone far from her, and it turned out she was right. Somewhere off down the hill she could hear a faint splashing and wordless singing in the distance.

Brushing grass off her skirt, she set off through the trees in the direction of the sounds. Before long she came to another section of broken wall, partly embedded into the hill, through which a clear spring flowed into a pool over the crumbled paving stones. Tumnus crouched on a fallen boulder, humming to himself and shaking water out of his curly hair.

He caught sight of her and froze, then his face broke out into a smile. "Good morning, Queen Lucy," he called.

She smiled back. Despite the added honorific, her name had been spoken with no more reverence than when she had been a child. Tumnus' strange distance the night before seemed to have vanished. She found this reassuring.

"Good morning," she called back, approaching the spring. This had once been a part of the parade road that had run the length of the wall, she realized. Most of the stones were gone, and what was left contained the water in a clear pool hollowed into the paving. Tadpoles swam in circles around water grasses that had sprung up between the cobbles.

She knelt beside the pool and gulped handfuls of cool water. It tasted glorious. She'd forgotten how thirsty it made one to sleep outside, after going up and down a river, climbing a hill and raiding a broken castle.

Midway through her drinking, she caught sight of herself in the rippling water and nearly laughed. Her face was streaked with dirt, now muddy from the water, and her hair stuck out in frizzy clumps. _How very queenly_, she thought to herself, splashing water on her face and hair and scrubbing furiously. She ran her fingers through the tangles, trying to calm the mass of curls the seawater had made of it. Not for the first time she envied Susan's easily-coifed locks, and was glad her sister couldn't see her right then.

She could feel Tumnus watching her, and she was certain he was amused. He leapt off his rock and nimbly cleared the water. "I've found us breakfast," he said, picking up the bundle of his scarf where it lay on the grass.

With a sigh she gave up on the hair. It was straight on top now, and that would have to do. Giving it a last tug, she turned to see what Tumnus had for them. It turned out to be apples, of course, but also a healthy pile of berries and nuts and even a piece of honeycomb wrapped in a leaf.

Lucy was delighted. "Clever faun!" she praised him, spreading the scarf out before them. Tumnus glowed proudly. The cordial and the night's rest seemed to have done him good, though he still looked haggard. They ate in companionable silence, their makeshift picnic on the grass between them. He had given the lion's share of the food to her, but she ate slowly and pushed some of it towards him when he wasn't looking.

She didn't complain when he gave her the larger piece of the honeycomb, however, and she ate it blissfully, savouring its perfect sweetness. Fresh honeycomb was a luxury not easily found in England, even after the war had ended. She had not tasted it since leaving Narnia.

Nor, it seemed, had she outgrown the inability to eat it without getting it all over her fingers. She was licking the stickiness off her wrist when she caught Tumnus watching her with the strangest expression. He turned pink and began coughing so hard she had to reach over and thump him on the back.

Lucy was puzzled yet again by the faun's behaviour, but chalked it up yet again to having suddenly awoken from being a statue. Nevertheless, when she was done eating she got up to rinse her hands in the water instead.

As she was doing so, she saw the boulder he had been sitting on and frowned. It seemed out of place amid the crumbling wall and broken flagstones. The paving stones beneath it had been pushed up from under it as though it had fallen from a great height, but it was too round and smooth to have come from the wall above.

He gaze fell beyond it, down the slope over the trees to the river winding away into the mainland. The Great River, she now knew, which meant the cave and Tumnus' statue had been somewhere north of it, in the Owlwood.

_He was so close to us the whole time,_ she thought with a lump in her throat.

Their searches had concentrated in the Shuddering Wood and the nearby areas, assuming that he hadn't made it far from the Lantern waste, but in later years the hunting party had turned to other less likely parts. She herself had led them up the River all the way to Beaversdam, year after year, never finding a trace.

Now he was trapped here with her, hundreds of years apart from everything he'd ever known. She felt as though she had failed him.

After a while Tumnus came to see what was troubling her, and she made herself act cheerful. They wrapped what was left of the food in her handkerchief (there wasn't much) and Tumnus re-donned his scarf, and they set about preparing to leave.

The first step found them back in the treasure room. Where before Lucy had felt awkward beneath the stone gaze of her older siblings, now she barely glanced at the statues as she pawed through the piles of relics searching for supplies for their journey.

It was a pity things like waterskins and satchels had not normally been stored among the treasures of Cair Paravel, but she eventually found some saddlebags that must have been Edmund's, still full of ore samples from one of his trips to the northern mines. He must have dropped them off in their last days here, waterskins and all, and forgotten about them. Whatever magic had kept the room sealed and the treasures preserved had kept the leather soft and supple, and it took very little effort to rig them up with straps into makeshift packs. She emptied her schoolbag to use as well.

She looked up to ask Tumnus if he wanted anything and saw him trying on a bell-shaped helmet that was far too big for him. Her laugh made him set it down hastily and shuffle away. She saw him glance at the statues of the Four, as if in trepidation.

She sighed and stood up. This was the part she had been avoiding, but there was no helping it. She set the bags down and walked over to stand before her siblings again. Her own statue beamed down at her, and she couldn't help smiling back. The sculptor they'd commissioned had been the funniest little dwarf she had ever seen, with enormous spectacles and a shock of bright red hair that stuck out like porcupine quills. All through her sitting she hadn't been able to keep from laughing at him, and so while her siblings' busts turned out solemn and dignified, hers was left with a ridiculous grin plastered across it.

_It suits you Lu, truly, _ Peter had said, while Ed and Susan had laughed themselves to tears over it.

Tumnus was standing beside her, staring up at her statue again. She felt a little embarrassed and quickly moved to open one of the chests.

She chose Peter's first. His sword and shield lay on at the top, the red Lion blazing up at her. Peter, her dearest older brother, who had always fiercely protected his family and his littlest sister. She lifted the sword reverently and felt her heart sink. It was heavy, far too heavy for her to carry on a long journey, let alone the shield with it. She set it down sadly, but left the chest open.

Edmund, dependable Edmund, had not had a gift like Peter's sword or her cordial, but his chest held several good hunting knives and a pair of sturdy boots that were only a little big on her. She also found a flask of brandy tucked inside a chainmail shirt, and snickered at her brother's cheekiness.

Susan's things were neatly ordered, her bow and quiver tucked aside between little pots of jewelry and folded dresses. These Lucy knew she could bring with her: she was almost as good an archer as her sister. She also took one of Susan's clean white linen shifts and, with childish delight, tore it into strips to use as wrappings. She convinced Tumnus to help with this, though he glanced nervously up at Susan's statue the whole time, while Lucy continued to paw through the chest in frustration.

"It's no use," she said finally. "It's not here."

"What isn't?" Tumnus asked, muffled by the bit of cloth he was tearing with his teeth.

"Susan's horn," Lucy said, vexed. "It was one of the things given us by Father Christmas, though I think they were really from Aslan. The horn is supposed to bring help whenever it's sounded."

Tumnus spat out the shift. "That would be useful now," he murmured.

She must have brought it with her when they'd left to hunt the White Stag, Lucy realized in dismay. There was no way to know what might have become of it. She closed the chest in regret, feeling as though one more link between her and her siblings had been severed.

Looking up, she saw Tumnus had finished destroying Susan's shift and was standing before Peter's open chest, tracing the Lion emblem on the shield with one hand. A lump caught in Lucy's throat at the sight. She couldn't bear to leave Peter's sword behind. She needed her brother's strength more than she ever had before.

Looking up at the High King's statue for guidance, she followed the stony gaze to the faun below it. Something in her head began to turn.

"Tumnus?" she came up behind him, making him jump and pull his hand back from the shield. She lifted the sword again and held it before her, hilt up, as though sizing it up. The faun was a bit bigger than she was, and Peter _had_ been young when he'd been given the weapon.

"Will you carry this?" she asked him. "It's too big for me."

He actually paled. "I ... I don't ... I couldn't possibly ..." he stammered. His hands twisted in his scarf, a nervous habit he seemed to be developing. "It was the _King's_ ... it isn't right."

Lucy smiled. "Is that all?" she said gently. "I can fix that." Unsheathing the sword, she gripped the hilt in both hands and lifted the point to rest on Tumnus' shoulder. It took all her strength to hold it steady as she touched him on both shoulders with it. "There. I dub you, Faun Tumnus, the official bearer of this sword until otherwise noted."

His cheeks flushed again, and he actually bowed a little. He looked so solemn that Lucy forced herself to bite back a giggle as she girded the swordbelt on him. Tumnus had clearly never carried a sword before, and it rested very awkwardly on his hip. She found him one of Peter's leather tunics so that the belt and strap didn't chafe his bare chest, but he refused to wear the shirt underneath, saying that if she had fur she'd understand.

She found them a couple of dark-coloured cloaks, took a spare dress of rust-red from her own chest, fitted Ed's hunting knife on the belt with her dagger and cordial, and strapped Susan's bow and quiver of red-fletched arrows over her shoulder. Making sure Ed's torch was safely in her satchel, she looked back at the four statues and smiled. Having something from each of them made her feel braver, as though they were somehow with her again.

Tumnus still stood beneath the High King's statue, fussing with the tunic. Even with the sword he didn't look anything like Peter, but held himself a little straighter and beneath his scarf his shoulders were set. Lucy found she liked the change. The leather tunic was so long it hung nearly to his shaggy knees and she thought, with a bit of a blush, that he looked rather dashing.

"We should go now," she said quickly, shouldering her pack. With some regret, she closed Peter's chest over the shield with the Lion emblem. She couldn't ask Tumnus to bear its weight as well. The sword was enough.

They left the treasure room, sliding the stone facade back into place. It was still early morning as they walked back through the ruins to the dais, and the shadows of what remained of the four thrones pointed long to the west, the direction they were to head.

_Goodbye,_ she thought, a little sadly. This had been her home once, after all, but time had changed it beyond repair. It was time to let go.

She gave a last look around the room that held so many old memories, and feeling suddenly bold, pulled out the flask of brandy and took a small swig. Sputtering a little, she grinned and handed it to Tumnus. He easily tipped back a swallow and returned the grin. They both saluted the Four and, hand in hand, turned and walked away to the west.

............

Hours later, Lucy was sorely regretting taking charge of this leg of the journey. Her arms ached, her back was sore, and she was certain her neck was burned bright red from the sun.

"Let's row south along the coast and go up the Glasswater Creek instead," she'd said to Tumnus as they'd launched their boat from the beach. "It isn't that far, and the current pushes it to flow inland, so we won't have to row as hard."

She remembered her Narnian geography fairly well, while Tumnus admitted he had never studied it much. It had seemed like a sound idea and the faun had agreed. Unfortunately, Lucy had underestimated how much effort was required to row in coastal waters, where the current kept trying to pull the boat away from the shore. There was no cover from trees out in the open either, and before long they both felt hot and thirsty. Luckily they'd remembered at the last minute to fill their waterskins at the spring, though they were careful to ration them as Lucy knew the Glasswater would be salty for a while inland as well.

Thankfully as well, Tumnus really was a clever faun. After watching Lucy row for a while he was able to figure out to do it himself, for which she was extremely grateful. He seemed to like it better than just sitting in the boat, which he said made him feel a little green, so he kept at it even after they'd reached the mouth of the creek.

So Lucy sat near the rudder and steered heedlessly, trying to keep her eyes open. After the hot sun, moving into the cool shady stream with its towering rock walls was making her dreadfully sleepy. Tumnus' soft melodic humming wasn't helping a bit either, and as the boat rocked back and forth she felt herself drifting along with it.

_She was flying, soaring high above the ground as though the wind had picked her up, as though she _was_ the wind, the very breath of Narnia, sweeping across it like a wave. Below her, she could see the river winding its way inland like a silver snake, the forests that covered the entire eastern coast (had there been that much before?) and the mountains far to the north. Below her, dark patches like oily clouds blotted out bits of the land, spreading little tendrils deeper and deeper into the forest ..._

A hand covered her mouth and she gasped, but it was only Tumnus. He crouched low beside her and put a finger to his lips, pointing out towards the bank. They had drifted beyond the coastal canyon walls and the banks were now smooth and rocky on the one side, with close overhanging trees on the other. She strained to see what it was he pointed at.

A snuffling noise came from the farthest bank and her heart leapt into her mouth. A large horned shadow skulked along the bank, just within the trees. A minotaur.

Lucy swallowed. There had been good minotaurs after the defeat of the White Witch, but there had also been some very bad ones, and they were all of them tempermental. She leaned close to Tumnus. "Has it seen us?"

His ear flicked at her breath. "I don't know," he whispered back. He was looking up and around at the closer shore for something, and when he spotted it he grabbed their packs and cloaks from the bottom of the boat.

Realizing what he was about to do, she quickly donned her gear as well and made ready. As the low hanging willow bough approached, Tumnus grabbed onto it and steadied the boat as she hauled herself into the tree. He pulled himself up after her and let their boat drift along with the current. Scurrying back to hide in the willow's leaves, they scanned the other shore for any sign of the minotaur's shadow, but saw and heard nothing.

"Oh bother," Lucy said irritably, as the boat floated around the bend. "My new school shoes were still in there."

They both laughed, mostly in relief, and climbed down. They were a great deal more careful after that, but they saw few other living things in the woods. Something about that was beginning to trouble Lucy, and it took a while for her to realize what it was.

"They're so still," she finally said.

Tumnus turned to see her looking up at the trees and frowned. "I didn't realize," he whispered. "I remember them frozen and asleep for so long ... but they should be awake now."

"They should be dancing," she agreed, touching the bark of a very old oak. It felt like a tree ought to, rough and hard, but she thought if she looked hard enough she might see the face of the person inside it. She saw nothing.

They moved on, but the silence only became heavier. There were no squirrels in the trees and no birdsong above, and while the canopy of trees kept the sun off them, it began to grow warm and muggy as the day wore on. The only thing that was there were insects, hundreds of little biting flies that attacked their sweaty skin, but eventually it grew too hot even for them. Every now and then they found a berry bush or a patch of mushrooms that Tumnus said were safe, and stopped to add them to their cache of food from Cair Paravel (which was mostly apples anyway).

Their attempts at conversation were easily quelched by the stillness, so Lucy occupied herself by watching her companion. He walked ahead of her, sliding with practised ease through the ferns and brush. His scarf had kept getting tangled with the sword hilt, so he'd wrapped it around his waist like a sash. He looked very bold and heroic with his hand on the sword, even though she knew he was only trying to keep it from slapping against his leg while he walked.

Suddenly he stopped, so abruptly that Lucy would have bumped into him if she hadn't been watching him so intently. He turned his head this way and that, ears twitching as they scanned the forest for any sound.

"Never mind," he said with a nervous laugh, shaking his head. "I thought I heard ..."

A low snarl made them both look up. Standing on a hillock above them was a very scrawny grey wolf. It bared its teeth at them, growling menacingly.

Tumnus had the sword out almost before she could blink. She hadn't even realized he knew how to draw it properly. He was shaking visibly, but he held the weapon steady. "Get back, Lucy," he said fearfully.

She took a step forward instead. "It's alright," she called to the snarling wolf. Not all wolves in Narnia were bad, only those who had formed Maugrim's pack. She put a hand on Tumnus' arm, though she didn't think she'd have to restrain him. "We won't hurt you," she said, keeping her voice gentle. "We're friends. We just want to talk."

The wolf only snarled louder and lunged, feinting. Lucy gasped and staggered back, but Tumnus stayed rooted to the spot. The beast crouched on its perch above them, its jaws dripping.

_It can't talk,_ she realize with horror. _It's _wild.

She pulled Susan's bow out of the quiver and with one fluid movement pressed it to her leg to string it. She had an arrow nocked in the next second and raised the bow just as the wolf sprung at Tumnus.

She didn't remember releasing the string, but felt it twang painfully against her forearm. The wolf landed in a crumpled heap on top of the faun, the red fletching sticking out of its neck.

Lucy ran to her friend and heaved the animal's body off him. He scurried back from it, still holding Peter's sword, which had buried itself deep into the wolf's chest. He didn't seem to be hurt, but he was shaking even harder and looked like he was about to faint.

"Here," she said gently. She helped remove the sword from the wolf's body and showed him how to clean it on the ferns. When he slid it back into the scabbard, his trembling had lessened considerably.

"Are you alright?" he asked her. It seemed a silly thing to say, since after all it wasn't she who had been under the wolf, but she was touched by it. She hugged him warmly, thinking he'd been just as brave as Peter had been when he'd killed Maugrim.

Tumnus stared over her shoulder at the dead wolf, its tongue lolling out of its open mouth, and looked as though he would be sick. Seeing his discomfort, she pulled him away from the dead animal, stroking his back with her hand.

"It's alright really," she assured him. "There seems to be something magic about that sword when it comes to wolves. You just must always remember to clean it," she added with a smile, winding her arm though his.

* * *

**_Next ... Chapter 6: Felling and Deceit_  
**_In which a grave crime is witnessed by our heroes, and something is encountered in the dead of night._


	6. Felling and Deceit

_Holy crap. When I sat down writing tonight, I didn't actually think I'd finish this chapter! Go me!_

_Bit of news ... I've started classes again. I'm in my final year of university, with all the loveliness that entails, and have a thesis project to boot. Suffice to say updates will be few and far between in the next few months, but in no way have I given up on this. I have the whole dang thing planned out, after all. It only remains to actually write it._

_You reviews and comments and letters to me have been fantastic. Even with the long delays between chapters, I hope you'll continue to show support for this story. It's wonderful to me, it truly is. Thank you so much._

_............

* * *

_

**Chapter 6: Felling and Deceit  
**_In which a grave crime is witnessed by our heroes, and something is encountered in the dead of night._

Though it was difficult to track the sun through the foliage, the day seemed to be in decline after their encounter with the wolf. The heat lessened as the sun dropped, which unfortunately meant the insects came back. Tumnus offered Lucy his scarf, but she found it unbearably stifling and soon gave it back. He kept it bundled around his neck with ends tied back, preferring it to the flies.

It reassured him as well, despite the sweat that trickled down his back beneath the leather tunic. It had seen him through a hundred years of winter, after all, and its soft weight was familiar and comforting even in the summer heat. Not like the sword, which hung around his waist like a dead weight and kept sliding down his hips as the belt did not cinch quite tight enough. He couldn't believe he had even thought of trying to fight off the wolf with that thing. He had never even held a sword before.

Lucy, sweet little laughing Lucy, hadn't frozen for an instant. She was the one who'd actually killed it, not him. And she'd looked so proud of him for standing his ground that he hadn't the heart to tell her he'd simply been too scared to move.

She walked along ahead of him now, adjusting their course further west every time she got a look at the sun. Her dress was the same deep vibrant green as the foliage around them, and if not for the red of her belt and arrows and the white of the ivory quiver she might easily have become part of the forest, vanishing amid the trees like a dryad.

Lucy the Valiant. That's what she had called herself back in he treasure room at Cair Paravel, and it certainly fit. She had known exactly what to do even after the beast was dead, while he stood gasping like a fish and trying not to be ill. He felt so foolish he wanted to wrap himself up in his scarf and disappear.

He was so caught up in feeling sorry for himself that he nearly jumped out of his skin when Lucy stopped walking and shouted, "Aha!"

They had come to where the trees pressed up against a number of very large grey rocks, which stood like weather-worn sentinels splashed with moss and lichen. Lucy clapped her hands and turned to him happily.

"I finally know where we are now!" she cried. "I remember this place! There weren't so many trees here before, it was all more open, but I believe we are quite near to the River Rush."

Tumnus tried hard to remember the names of all the rivers in Narnia, but while he'd had a few very nice maps in his home alongside his father's dusty old books and treatises, he'd never looked at them much. Geography had never been a particular interest of his, a fact he was beginning to regret.

"There was a crossing on the other side of these rocks," Lucy went on, "I'm sure of it. After that, we'll be quite close to the Shuddering Wood, and I'm _sure_ we'll find someone there who can tell us what is going on here."

Tumnus hurried after her, feeling suddenly much lighter. The Shuddering Wood was very near to the Lantern Waste, separated only by the Frozen Lake and the Telmar River. Well, he amended to himself, it probably wasn't frozen any longer. And his cave was probably no longer there anymore. Still, it felt good to think of something familiar to _his_ Narnia, and he found he dearly wanted to stand with Lucy under the lamppost once again.

Lucy's memory turned out less accurate when it came to navigating the rocks. They followed numerous twists and turns into dead ends before they finally found a way through the maze, only to emerge from the trees and stop dead short.

The ground fell away before them as though cut with a knife, the sheer cliffs framing a hundred foot drop straight down. At the bottom of the gorge lay the river, winding like a white snake below. They both stood there, dumbfounded, staring at the impassable crevice.

"Oh, I _am_ an idiot," Lucy spat, stamping her foot. "I can just hear Susan now: 'Over time the water erodes away the earth and soil ...'" her voice became high and singsong.

"Perhaps there's a way down?" Tumnus suggested tentatively. He was so surefooted that heights did not usually bothered him, though this was admittedly higher up than he'd ever been before. He knelt down and carefully gripped the edge of the cliff. Lucy gasped as he leaned his whole upper body over the precipice.

"What are you doing?! Come away from there!" She grabbed onto the tails of his scarf, as though to keep him from tumbling over. "Oh, please!"

Her grip on the scarf was choking him, so he obliged her. "I didn't see anything," he gasped, tugging the garment loose.

She wrung her hands, looking extremely agitated. "Oh, let's just go," she said miserably, turning away from the gorge. "I've led us completely the wrong way. We shall have to find another way across."

"Yes," Tumnus agreed, nodding his head. As he did he thought he caught sight of something on the far side, but when he looked he saw only the sun shining on the cliff. Still, as they made their way back through the rocks he kept glancing over his shoulder, feeling as though they were leaving something behind they ought to have remembered.

............

Tumnus had wanted to stop in the rocks, thinking they could both use a rest and a meal, but Lucy insisted on pressing on. She dallied only long enough to decide whether to follow the Rush up or downstream, deciding finally to head north back towards the Great River.

"South was where the minotaur was," she said, "and the Great River is still passable, in any case, so we're better off finding a way across there."

She did not speak much after that, and the faun could tell that she still rankled at leading them wrong, though it really hadn't been her fault. The thick forest growth made it dangerous to try and follow right alongside the gorge (and neither of them wanted to in any case), so they set a course vaguely northward through the trees. As the sun became increasingly hard to see, Lucy grew increasingly frustrated, doubling back and retracing her steps more than once. Eventually she fell back and Tumnus found himself in the lead, and much to his surprise he found he did quite well. He had a better sense of direction than she even in the fading light and found he could pick a much easier path through the undergrowth. Unfortunately, this did not improve the young queen's mood: she strode along a few paces behind him and sulked.

It was after a good few hours of this uncomfortable silence that Tumnus remembered neither of them had eaten anything since midday, and thought this would not do at all. He paused to try and dig an apple out of his pack and Lucy, who was not at all watching where she was going, walked straight into him and sent them both sprawling into the bushes.

"Why on earth did you stop?!" she growled petulantly, struggling out of a tangle of thorns. Tumnus couldn't answer, as he'd fallen on the sword hilt and it had given him a painful jab to the side. They both floundered helplessly in the bushes for a while, but by the time they managed to put themselves to rights they were strangely in much better spirits. They picked up the things that had fallen from Tumnus' open pack and Lucy fussed over his bruised ribs, and then they set off again together, this time side by side.

Lucy very quickly surprised him by apologizing. "You've been going on about how grown-up I am now," she said with a wry smile, "and here I'm still acting like a silly child. I _am_ sorry, Tumnus," she sighed.

He smiled and for once did not feel himself blush. "I thought you've been quite remarkable," he said honestly, and feeling quite brave, he slipped his hand into hers. She blinked in surprise, but then her fingers curled around his and she swung their hands together as they walked, smiling brightly, and his heart suddenly felt wonderfully light.

The feeling lasted only a short time, for Lucy stopped abruptly, her gaze locked on a patch of leaves lying on the ground ahead. "Did you see that?"

Tumnus had not seen a thing, unless she was talking about the little curl of hair that fell around her ear. He looked to where she pointed and forgot about hair and ears and freckles.

The leaves before them undulated, rolling haltingly over the forest floor and swirling together in a slow, lazy spiral. No wind rustled the trees over head, yet the dry dead leaves seemed to be struggling somehow, trying to lift themselves up off the ground. Tumnus' breath caught in his throat as they began to form into a vaguely human shape, sprawled upon the ground as though in great agony. It raised a quivering hand to them, the brittle leaves rustling like old bones, and suddenly there was a tremendous crash and the figure dissolved, the leaves fluttering about in all directions as though blown apart by a heavy gust neither of them could feel.

Lucy's hand went stiff and cold in his. Leaves had settled into her hair, crowning her head like a wreath, and she looked as though she were about to be sick. From far off, another deep crack sounded which cut them both to the heart.

"They're felling trees!" Lucy gasped. She wrenched her hand from his and took off, bounding like a deer toward the sound.

He shouted to her, springing after her as quickly as he could. She was _fast_ when she chose to be, he realized, but it wasn't long before he caught up to her. It turned out there hadn't been very far to go. The Great River glittered at them, blue and shallow and inviting, and completely swarming with Telmarines.

Aside from Lucy, Tumnus had never seen a Son of Adam or a Daughter of Eve before, and had never imagined that so many of them could ever be seen together in Narnia. They swarmed like ants across the riverbank, soldiers in black armour and bare-chested workmen, and what they were doing made him feel cold to the marrow of his bones.

Dozens upon dozens of the great trees that had lined the riverbank had been felled, leaving a bare field of jagged stumps. The timber was stacked in great piles everywhere, and men worked away with saws and axes to topple more of the noble giants.

Yet it wasn't this horrible crime that was the centrefold of the scene before them. Spanning across nearly a third of the river was a skeleton of timber, the framework of some feat of human construction. An enormous pulley rigged with a great stone mallet pounded the logs deeper and deeper into the ground, and with each heavy fall the weight felt like it struck Tumnus between the shoulders.

Lucy pulled him to hunker down behind a pile of stripped logs, which oozed fresh sap like blood. Her eyes were filled with angry tears. "Oh, how _can_ they?" she hissed, clenching her fists. "Don't they _know_?"

Tumnus could not have said whether they did or not, but it certainly seemed they did not _care_. He peered over their grisly cover, careful not to touch to wood any more than necessary. There was an air of grim desperation over the place. Whatever the reason for what lay before them, there was something grave in its purpose and the faun felt it like a noose around his neck.

"I'm going to go closer," he said.

At first he could not believe what he had just said. Lucy's eyes went wide, and of course she began protesting vehemently, but as it turned out she was actually arguing that she should go and not him, and this he absolutely could not allow. He won out by claiming that he could be much quieter than she. He had lived in the forests all his life, he said, and there was not a faun born in Narnia that couldn't sneak through the trees without making a sound.

"But your scarf," she said, never one to give in. "Surely they'll see it."

He unwound the red muffler and settled it around her neck. "Hold onto it until I get back, then," he said with a nervous smile. Making sure the sword was on straight, he quickly hurried off through the trees before she could say anything more.

He felt strangely exhilarated. Perhaps it was the sight of something that could only be a nightmare, perhaps it was the fear and anger pumping through his heart, but whatever the reason he felt charged through every muscle. Even the sword, which had until now been an annoyance, rested more naturally at his side as he slipped through the trees, moving closer to the camp.

There was a ring of covered wagons that stood nearly within the treeline. A number of armoured Telmarines stood nearby, and by the sound of their voices something was certainly amiss. The faun crouched amid the bracken in the shadow of the nearest wagon, and from there had a clear view of what passed.

"They came in the night, like ghosts," one man said.

"How much did they take?" asked the man who faced him. Both their voices were heavily accented, like the soldiers who had attacked Lucy, but one of the men wore fine, dark-coloured clothes while the rest stood in sturdy but dented armour. That one, whose eyes were cold and hard and whose face sported a well-trimmed beard, had an air about him that reminded Tumnus uncomfortably of the White Witch.

"Enough for three regiments," was the grudging reply. "But there's more." The soldier lifted the back of the wagon for the other to see. From his vantage Tumnus could only guess as to what they saw, but the bearded man read it aloud.

"'You were right to fear the woods,'" his face twisted into a grimace. "'X'. Caspian," he said to the soldier, who looked confused. "The Tenth." He seemed to be grinding his teeth, and his black eyes glittered.

"Tell me, General Glozelle," he continued with a deliberate gaze on the other man, putting heavy emphasis on the first word, "how many men did you lose?"

The general looked confused. "None, Lord Miraz," he said. "We did not even see them."

The man's face twisted again, and he spoke as if to a child. "Then how did you come by your injuries?"

Glozelle remained confused. Without pause for breath, Miraz backhanded him hard across the face with his armoured glove. "I asked you, general," he said, drawing the man's sword from its sheath and holding it out to him, "how many men did you lose, in this bloody and vicious ... _Narnian_ attack, of which you were a ... fortunate survivor?"

His voice, smooth as silk, sent chills up Tumnus' spine. The general, his lip bleeding, cast a look behind him at the three other soldiers who stood there, then looked back to Miraz and slowly took the sword that was held to him. "Three," he said finally.

The man smiled, hard as a knife. "My condolences," he said quietly, and turned to walk away. "I apologize, Lord Sopespian," he continued, to the other man in fine clothes who stood a few paces away. "It appears I was wrong. Prince Caspian is not a victim of these attacks, but their instigator. This changes everything."

Their voices faded as they strode out of earshot, where Miraz mounted a white horse and galloped away. Tumnus felt a tightness in the back of his neck loosen as the man vanished from sight.

The soldier with the bloody lip had not moved, but stood as though rooted to the ground. Slowly, as though made of lead, he turned to his men, the sword still clenched in his fist. They looked to their leader, not daring to move, and the world seemed to hold its breath. For a moment the general's gaze drifted over where the faun crouched hidden in the shadow of the wagon, and his eyes looked lost, harrowed and helpless. Finally, he tightened his grip on the sword and took a step forward.

Tumnus looked away. He heard the sword blows fall and clenched his teeth, squeezing his eyes shut.

............

He made his way back to Lucy as soon as at seemed safe. Luckily she'd had the sense not to stay beside the pile of wood and had moved off to hide in the underbrush. She came out as soon as she saw it was him, and they hurried off a safe distance from the sounds of the camp. By then it was growing dark and there was far less chance of them being seen, but they did not stop until they could no longer hear the pounding of the great mallet. Then Tumnus told her what he had seen and heard, though he could not bring himself to say anything of the three unfortunate soldiers.

"I don't understand any of it," Lucy said, shaking her head. "Who is Prince Caspian? And what are Telmarines doing in such force so deep in Narnia? It doesn't make any sense at all."

Tumnus had no answer. He felt strangely cold deep inside and could barely stomach the supper of damp mushrooms and slightly soft apples that Lucy dug out of their packs. It was a far cry from the warm sea breeze and glittering sky atop the hill at Cair Paravel. The tiny biting flies still hovered around them, but neither of them seemed to notice much anymore.

"We'll find another way across tomorrow," Lucy said finally, breaking the dismal silence as she huddled into her cloak, shivering slightly. "But for now we should get some sleep. I'm dreadfully tired."

So was he, he realized. Whatever bout of exhilaration he had felt earlier seemed to have left him and left him lacking. His silence and discomfort was plain to his friend, who after a moment's hesitation unwound the red scarf from her neck.

"You were very brave today," she admitted, wrapping it snugly around him. She smiled proudly at him, and for a moment new warmth began to creep into his middle. Moving closer to the young queen, he settled the long tail of his scarf over her shoulders, thinking she'd be glad for its warmth now, and nearly choked on his heart when she curled it around herself and leaned right into his chest, yawning.

For a moment he was frozen even worse than when facing the wolf. Awkwardly, he managed to put his arms around her, feeling an alarming pounding in his ears. This was Lucy, he reminded himself, who'd danced in the forest with him and held his hand on the grass beneath the apple trees. There was nothing _wrong_, surely. He rested his chin on her head and she shifted a little as his curly beard brushed her forehead. No, she was only cold, that was it. There was nothing wrong at all.

Except that she felt quite warm, actually.

He wasn't sure how long he sat there with Lucy snuggled up against him. She had fallen asleep almost immediately, while he couldn't seem to make himself close his eyes. It wasn't her nearness that kept him from sleeping this time. He kept seeing the faces of those three soldiers in his mind, which was odd as he had only barely even glimpsed them. The shadows of minotaurs seemed to skulk around in the trees just out of sight, and wolves seemed to creep behind every fern. The thought of more wolves, even wild and stupid ones, was enough to keep him wide awake.

It had been Maugrim's pack that had run him to ground after he'd fled the Lantern Waste. They had tormented him for hours in that cave, even before that horrible little dwarf had shown up with his iron cudgel and hacked his horns off. When that wolf had appeared on the ledge above them, he had thought for a terrible moment that Maugrim had somehow found him again.

_Foolish, foolish faun_, he berated himself. Maugrim was long dead, like everyone else from that time. There was new danger here now, one that didn't have anything to do with wolves or Witches, and only he and Lucy were left to face it.

He was painfully aware of the girl sleeping against his chest ... how could he not be? She had given him her brother's sword to carry. _King_ Peter's sword. He felt the solemn eyes of the High King's statue boring into the back of his head again, and felt very grim and serious. Her family was not there to protect her now. For her sake, he couldn't afford to be so afraid.

A twig snapped, and every hair along his back stood up straight. He didn't move a single muscle, didn't even twitch an ear. After a few moments some ferns rustled nearby. His heart began to pound. The sound was much nearer this time.

_Don't be afraid,_ he chanted in his head. He unwound his arms from Lucy and tried to wake her, but she only groaned and curled her fingers so tightly in his scarf that he had to untangle it from around his own neck. He gently settled her back against a tree with the red muffler wrapped around her and, with his hand holding the sword still, carefully began creeping through the ferns towards the noise. _Don't be afraid, don't be afraid ..._

He was as quiet as the wind. He couldn't see well in the dark, but he could hear quite clearly. There were footsteps, very soft and careful ones, sneaking all the closer to where Lucy was sleeping. He didn't try to draw the sword this time, but crouched in the shadow of a tree instead and held his breath. When a low shadow crept past him, he sprang at it.

He hit it head-first, forgetting he no longer had a set of horns to ram it with, but the force was enough to send them both crashing through the underbrush. Whatever he'd attacked felt like nothing so much as a child-sized bundle of solid muscle. Feet and fists flailed wildly and enraged muffled curses rang through the trees, but Tumnus refused to let up his grip even when a heel caught him in the stomach and knocked the wind out of him.

A sudden flood of bright light stopped the both of them mid-scuffle, and Tumnus was suddenly looking down on the face of a very angry, very disgruntled dwarf with bushy eyebrows and an amazing shock of bright red hair.

Lucy stood before them, holding the silver wand she called a torch in front of her. She clutched the scarf around her shoulders, wide-eyed. "What on earth are you doing?" she asked, bewildered.

* * *

_**omg guys! It's Trumpkin! Who'd'a thunk?**_

**_Next ... Chapter 7: What Lurks in the Dark_  
**_In which our heroes find unexpected aid, and a dangerous undertaking nearly goes horribly awry._


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